When ransomware strikes, it can be devastating for your organization. Businesses forked over $1 billion in ransom payments for the first time in 2023 – and this year is to be even worse as cyber-attacks spike.
For some businesses, not paying ransom demands seems worse than the consequences of leaving their IT systems and organisational data in the hands of hackers.
Data breaches dominate headlines, and for organisations handling large amounts of sensitive data, like government agencies, financial institutions and law firms etc, a breach can leave them with heavy fines and their reputation in tatters. Enter ransomware data recovery, a response to ransomware attacks that allows organisations to respond to ransomware threats without giving in to cybercriminal’s ransom demands.
This guide tells you everything you need to know about ransomware data recovery and explores how it helps organisations recover from ransomware threats.
What is ransomware data recovery?
Ransomware data recovery is the process of restoring encrypted data following a ransomware attack. It allows victims of ransomware to decrypt their files without giving in to criminal ransom demands, relying on backup systems and data decryptions tools to recover the stolen data.
Restoring from data backups is the most reliable way to recover encrypted data during ransomware data recovery. If organizations have a recent backup of your files and their data is stored on a separate system, they can simply restore them from their most recent backup to restore data hackers have encrypted.
However, this isn’t always possible since some organizations don’t have a reliable backup system or multiple systems where they store their data. That’s why organisations turn to decryption experts like SIP International, who have specialised tools and techniques for recovering data from ransomware-encrypted devices.
Opting for ransomware data recovery is always better than giving in to ransom demands following an attack. Paying the ransom does not guarantee that victims will get their files back, and it often encourages attackers to continue targeting victims with further attacks.
How does ransomware data recovery work?
Ransomware data recovery uses several different methods, depending on the recovery systems organizations have available and the specific circumstances of the attack.
- Backup and restore
For organisations with solid backup systems, restoring data from a backup is the safest and most reliable method for recovering encrypted data. This is why it’s crucial to have a robust backup strategy in place before attacks strike, as regular backups to external drives or cloud storage can be the difference between retrieving data or not.
Before recovering data from a backup, organizations must first disconnect the infected device from the network to prevent the infection from spreading. Once the threat is contained, they will then need to identify a clean, uninfected backup of your data—whether it be from a recent external hard drive backup, cloud storage version, or a network-attached storage snapshot.
If the attack has compromised entire IT systems as well as encrypting data, cybersecurity specialists will need to get involved to restore these systems. Most attackers today not only encrypt data, but also take entire systems down, so a simple backup may not be enough to recover from a ransomware attack.
- Data Recovery Software:
For organisations that don’t have a backup system in place to recover the data, data recovery software attempts to exploit vulnerabilities in the specific ransomware used to decrypt compromised files. However, this is a gamble, and success depends on the type of ransomware and the capabilities of the specific software being implemented. Data recovery software can also be expensive and isn’t guaranteed to work against all kinds of ransomware attacks.
- Shadow Copies (Windows Only):
Windows has a built-in feature called System Restore that creates shadow copies of your system, including copies of your files. If ransomware has only encrypted the files stored on a computer, there is a chance of recovering them from these shadow copies. This isn’t a foolproof method, however. Restoring from shadow copies might not work for all files, and the feature might have been disabled on your system.
- Data Recovery Services
Data recovery services have experience with various ransomware strains and have developed methods to address specific encryption methods. Many also possess sophisticated tools and techniques that go beyond what basic software might offer, allowing them to bypass or exploit weaknesses in the encryption process used by the ransomware to restore the encrypted data.
At SIP, our technicians are familiar with various ransomware variants and their encryption methods. Our decryption experts have years of experience in restoring encrypted data while maintaining data integrity throughout the entire ransomware data recovery process.
What happens if you can’t recover your encrypted data?
If organizations can’t recover encrypted data following a ransomware attack and refuse to pay ransom demands, their data may be shared publicly or on the dark web or permanently removed from their systems, resulting in data loss.
If the encrypted data includes critical business documents, personal files, or irreplaceable creative work, losing them can be devastating. Data loss can lead to operational downtime, lost productivity, and potential revenue setbacks. Depending on the nature of the encrypted data, it can also hamper business continuity and lead to future attacks.
If organisations can’t recover the encrypted data themselves, they should consider consulting IT security professionals or data recovery specialists like SIP International for alternative recovery methods or potential workarounds, depending on the specifics of your situation.
There are rare cases where the cost and complexity of data recovery outweigh the value of the lost data. This could be true for personal data that can be recreated or business data with readily available backups elsewhere.
However, accepting the loss can be difficult, especially if organisational value is attached to the data.
Why Choose SIP for intelligence-led ransomware data recovery
At SIP, we are committed to ensuring total data integrity throughout the entire recovery
Process. Our experienced cyber security specialists are dedicated to providing quick, efficient, and cost-effective data recovery services with minimal interruption.
If you have fallen victim to a ransom attack, SIP is here to help. Our team of decryption experts will guide you through our detailed engineering process to recover your data and get your business back up and running. We will provide a detailed presentation and quotation for our diagnostics process and recovery services, as well as personalised security measures to enhance the security of your systems and data.
In addition to our data recovery services, SIP offers a comprehensive investigation service designed to identify the parties responsible for the attack. Our investigation approach is informed by the intelligence gathered during the analysis of the infiltration method and any other information discovered during the forensic recovery process.
